


swords held by strings

by gunshy



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M, Molestation, Unreliable Narrator, Verbal Abuse, hints of psiioniic, mental trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-17
Updated: 2012-10-17
Packaged: 2017-11-16 12:23:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/539384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gunshy/pseuds/gunshy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"you're caught between holding your splitting head and pushing him away"</p>
            </blockquote>





	swords held by strings

**Author's Note:**

> This story is a confusing mess of implications,  
> It's my first time typing quirks so help if I'm wrong please.  
> 

/

he motions for you to come over with the cock of his head and the waggle of a finger.

“come here,” Cronus says in a voice as oily as his hair. you look behind you then back at the violet-blood, fidgeting your hands and threading your fingers into each other, trying to keep your arms from jerking up into the air and gesticulating wildly like a marionette with tangled strings and a drunken puppeteer.

you approach Cronus in awkward little shuffles, the legs of your suit rubbing together and working up a static charge. Cronus hates when you do that because it means he has to comb his hair again to keep the frizz from cramping his self-expression. then again, he seems to hate everything you do - and you suspect he's just looking for excuses to glob more of that foul black styling tar onto his head.

as you get closer, you think you notice something different about him...though maybe the detail'd just managed to escape your memory. namely, he's wearing a short black-colored coat that was probably recovered from one of the many treasure chests littered throughout the memoryscape. (you yourself couldn't get a single one of the damn things to open for the longest time and had cracked many a skateboard in two trying to smash your way into the boxes before realizing that none of the chests were actually locked.)

when you are an arm's reach away he gets impatient and grabs your wrist to pull you closer. before you know it, you are unnecessarily close to his body and his lips are against the side of your helmet as he tells you to: “check out the newv threads.” you want to tell him you can't hear so great through the helmet like that but the thought comes and goes too quickly to act upon.

his thumb idly rubs the underside of your wrist - more a tic than an attempt at seduction - as you glance all about, taking in his apparently 'new' garment as you get increasingly uncomfortable. (you try to ease your wrist from his grip but it just tightens. you try again with a hard jerk but he won't relinquish his hold on you.) you're close enough to take in the overpowering stench of the thing, a kind of unplaceable smell that's both earthy and artificial.

now with a captive audience, Cronus seems compelled to further explain his newest acquisition, “its an earth garment fashioned from the dried skin of dead hoofbeasts.”

you pull a face. _that's gross._ he doesn't seem to notice.

“so...thoughts?” he finally drops your wrist and takes a step back to stretch out his arms, showing off his updated outfit and beaming with pride. you let out a dry sob of relief once the contact is gone.

“do i look human as all get-go, or vwhat?”

“Y0U L00K L13K 4 C0LL0574L F4GG07 1NN 4 C0RP53 J4CK-17.” you cradle your bruising wrist to your chest and snap at him with a smile that's all teeth. “WH0Z D4RK 53RKR37 C4V35 D1D UY0U H4LV3 T0 PLUNDURR 2 UNC0VR4R 7H15 GIG4NT1C P137H3 0F 5H17???"

Cronus' face falls into a downtrodden look. “...it vwas a RHETORICAL question...”

but his demeanor quickly brightens and he slaps you on the back of the helmet, making your brain bounce painfully inside your skull.

“of course, you cant think long enough to form an actual opinion on something!” he gives you hard paps to the helmet as he's speaking, until your head is positively throbbing and you can barely make out his words over the sound of your own racing pulse.

“as someone intimately familiar vwith 50s greaser culture, i recognize this piece of parafinalia as a crucial find in my ongoing process to awvaken and embrace the human inside.”  
#darnit #paraFINalia #accidental fish pun

“1F Y0 D0N7 M0V3 YUR H4ND UL H4LF T0 GR3353 UYR H41R W17H5 4 57HUMP. AHEH33” you snicker to yourself and the pain eases a micron. “7H0NGH 1 C0ULD 4LLW4Y5 H4LP SL1CK YU0R 57HUMP F0R UY0Y0!!”  
#N0T AC1D3N74L 1NY0UR3ND0

Cronus looks put off and stops the paps. as you grasp the sides of your helmet to try and realign your battered brain, he settles you with a suspicious stare. “you are such a bully. you keep teasing me with remarks like that but reject all my advwances. i think people just like to hurt me...” a disheartened expression makes another tearful appearance. “luckily i can channel that pain into my music and artwvork.”

that comment makes you go still and quit scratching at your helmet. _your friend is hurt_? something inside you always breaks at the thought, even when you'd think there'd be nothing left unbroken.

how could you let him down like that? how could you _do_ this to them? why does it always have to end this way? why isn't anything you do good enough to keep them _safe_ –

“1M 50RRY.” you blurt out, already forgetting what you're apologizing for. despite that, the guilt is still caving your chest in, making it hard to shout.

Cronus is leering at you. “i dont need YOUR pity,” he growls, shifting his cigarette to the other corner of his mouth. his eyes brighten and he snaps his fingers, startling you out of your funk. “vwhich reminds me! i vwant to showv you my latest--”

“DUN W4NN4 533 17,” you shriek as your body resumes its compulsive twitch.

Cronus frowns. “come on, man, be a friend--” he grabs your arm like before and pulls you into him and the twitch escalates to a quake running up and down your spine.

“N0 N0 N0,” you frantically shake your head and the cranial ache returns. the helmet is supposed to keep everything in place but you still feel like you're falling apart.

Cronus' frown slips into a terrifying grimace as his grasp quickly turns vicious, digging chitinous claws into your bodysuit, pressing on the resistant fabric hard enough to break the skin beneath. “vwhy do you gotta be such a square! stop it and just let me--”

“N0N0N0N0N0,” you're caught between holding your splitting head and pushing him away and both seem like equally futile actions. something about _everything_ suddenly seems wrong, and in a white flash--

 _you see blurring bits of a life you almost had and mourn for a self you could have been. you enter the heart of a great and terrible ship and peer into bleeding red and blue eyes to see the same dead stare hidden beneath your own visor. there's someone screaming your name and you try to respond but a cold terror has settled across your limbs and you are drowning in the sensation of destruction, sinking into a slurry of your own blood and the melting, overtaxed internals of the ship. energy crackles along every nerve in an agony your currently numb self can only remember as a phantom pain. she's crouched in front of you, desperate, sweating and swearing in a panic, and behind you there's a distant sound approaching fast...much faster than you, too terrible to reach your ears before_ \--

you emerge from the vision with a gasp.

Cronus is still talking at you, hand unmoved, not even noticing you'd slipped into a flashback (or flash _theoreticallyforward_?). ever since the accident there are some days it feels you've lived entire lives that never really existed--cruised along every possible branch of space-time existence, attempting ollies and falling flat among the stars.

“vwhy cant any of you appreciate my vwork? you all get that same glazed look vwhenevwer i evwen mention it! am i too progressivwe to handle? maybe that vwindbag kankri is right, hes the only one that supports my rewvolutionary ideologies.” Cronus' blank eyes have a weird intensity to them still - something about the way his eyelids squint and his brow furrows - and you're glad that no one can see your eyes anymore because they've lost the ability for that kind of focus. “it vwould be so much easier to just be human already...and at least their vwomen knowv howvow-v..." Cronus pauses a moment, hung up on his vw's. he clears his throat and tries again. "blegh, i mean their ladies understand the vway their meant to act, aka not exclusivwely like neurotic maniacs. plus i hear they only hawve, like, one quadrant to fill.”

that drags you out of your muddy headspace with a laugh, an entertaining mental image appearing of Cronus as one of those gross fleshbags, moochin over other gross fleshbags in a flushed orgy that had all the mating finesse of six-legged canines in heat.

you're having some trouble articulating the nuances of that immensely entertaining tableau - and it only takes a second for your brain to turn words into the semi-digested letters of yesterday's alphabet soup floating in today's load gaper - so instead you cackle and exclaim  
“WH475 U53 4 W0M3NZ WHEN Y00 L1K3Z CHUMP1NG F15H D1CKZ 0YU FUUCK1NG F15H757!!!!1AH HAHA HA!!”

“I do NOT like fish dick!!” Cronus--who seems to remember he's holding you in a way you never forgot--finally pushes you away with a shout, “I fuckin _lowve_ human vwang!”

“4HHS4HZHZH4H4HAA!!!!!!!!” you keep laughing hysterically, unable to stop yourself even once tears begin to run down your cheeks and your lungs start burning for air.

amidst the laughter you've somehow toppled to the ground and started curling into a ball, tittering absurdly until he delivers a swift kick to your head. the helmet holds on tight but the jolt causes a glitch in your system and you stop laughing as the world goes black.

when you come to seconds later your skin tingles and your mind burns and you want the honey please, Bicyclops, please _please..._

“eeeeyyy, you okay?” Cronus leans down to ask with something that _s_ ounds like genuine concern.

the kindness is deceptive, and suddenly you aren't sure anymore if it was him that kicked you or just your brain banging inside your helmet again, trying to get back out. he can see the empty confusion on your face and it makes him smile with a grin that makes you uncomfortable. he looks like a shark that's just gotten away with a meal—absconding through blood-streaked waters, the remains of a young troll that'd wandered too close to shore wedged between its teeth.

“be more careful, you gotta quite falling like that. just imagine if i vwerent here to pick you back up and vwe vwere on our descendents planet? youd be eaten alivwe by other trolls, ones vwith better blood than your vweak dribble. honestly, i should be devwouring you alivwe right nowv ... youre so lucky that im such a chill guy vwho doesnt mind helping out a pathetic loser like you.”

you sigh and go limp for a moment on the ground, body practically deflating into the thick grass. maybe he's right.

_maybe you were always going to fail._

you stagnate in the thought for a second, but when you see him reaching for your arm to help you stand, you are quick to roll your body away, squirming in the dirt like a petulant grub.  
“DUN T0UCH M3H, MU7H3RF4HCK3R”  
#7R0LL W1534U

you can tell from a glance that Cronus is about fed-up with your shenanigans. you know by the throb of his forehead scars and the sharp tilt of his cigarette. you don't recognize how done he is until he's down and on top of you in the dirt, straddling your pelvis, the odorous stench of his hair-gel making an unpleasant cameo in your olfactory system. one hand fisted in the front of your jumper, he says in a low, threatening voice, “i'll touch anybody vwhenevwer i vwant.”

“W34R3 1Z K1NKR1 H4LP 1 M B TR4GG3R” you gasp out, his lithe form on your body feeling much heavier than it should because it carries with it a burden of disaster that quickly settles over you in a crushing embrace.

Cronus stares at you a moment and then pushes a stray lock of black hair back up into the confines of your helmet and the soft touch is so much more to handle than a blow. you shrink away from the simple stimulation that overwhelms your raw senses.

it's quiet a moment and you hold the faint hope (and hope is always faint, little more than just getting up and trying again) that it's all over and now he might like to watch you being radical on the railings, maybe even help perfect the gnarly trick you've been making for Latula, and you don't care if he says no because you can always come back to ask again and again until maybe-- but those thoughts are dashed when he leans down over you until his breath is hot against your neck. his touch is slow and careful now, so different from the hard grip on your arm from before.

“i like you, mitty.” he murmurs.

_so much crueler._

“i really do like you because i can let evwerything out and you take it all. i dont hawve to try so hard to hold back my feelings from you, because you hawve nothing that anyone but me could evwer vwant.” he keeps going even though you are starting to shake as his voice gets deeper and more dangerous. “see i vwas honest, i don't need sea-schlong. i can dig your ugly mustard tube. i'm not a shallowv guy.”

Cronus leans down further, draping his body over yours. so many points of contact are being made that the sensation of _being touched_ crashes over you like a tsunami and you start hyperventilating. you want to get out and get away but can't command your body to work with you in any cohesive manner. at this point, you can barely even speak except for the slim expletives crawling their way through your tightly-clenched teeth.

when he rests a hand on your face, your body tries to jerk away--the movement of your hips shoving against his and causing a chain reaction as he makes a soft noise inspired by your bucking. there's a look in his empty eyes when he opens them to stare at you, and the shark analogy is back. you aren't going to make it out of this encounter in one piece.

you're rocked by regret and you're sorry for getting this close to him in the first place...for not understanding what it all meant in time to stop it. for still not understanding what it means. you are sorry, so so sorry, sorry, sorry _sorry_

“stop scarring the leather, you subtroll slime of dross coffer sludge!”

“1M 50RRY.” you gasp and yank your claws out from where they'd sunk into his jacket without your knowledge.

“vwhy vwon't you stop saying that! “ Cronus says in a tight voice, his throat visibly working to restrain from shouting and he shakes his head to clear the purplish blush rapidly spreading throughout his face. “you cant help it, i knowv, tuna, youre just so glubbing re...restricted in the vword bank because your heads so fucking bruised from all those awvful divwes you take to get sympathy from latula and the others. maybe you keep saying sorry because you SHOULD be sorry for vwhat a fuckin mess you are.”

“1YM 54R1.”

a white pain spikes through your face and when your vision clears you see Cronus with his hand still drawn back from the slap he just gave you.

fuck you apologized again, didn't you? dammit can't you do _anything_ _right_!?! “4N75H0133157555CF57HHH!!!!1!11!!” you spit out rapid nonsense, venting your frustration and spewing spittle everywhere before another slap shuts your mouth but triggers your arms and legs to start flailing anew. if you weren't already pressed so hard into the dirt, you'd have collapsed into a spectacular heap of limbs.

Cronus is momentarily flabbergasted by the display, cigarette almost falling from between his lips. “almighty COD, mit, vwhat the GLU8 is vwrong vwith you?!” he gets a grip on himself and then a grip on you as he presses you down by the shoulders. “vwhy do they evwen LIKE you? howv can she stand to be around such an insensitive vwreck of a troll!?”

he bears down on you again, keeps pushing forward and pulling back like the ocean lapping at a lonely shore, all of his weight pressed against your pelvis. you register that Cronus' hips have been moving against yours this whole time in a slow grind.

“FFFFFF77H7--“ you try speaking but end up sputtering as if the sounds are being squeezed from your throat.

you take deep shuddering breaths when he trails a hand along your side to settle on your hip. you start screaming and he shoves a hand over your mouth, desperate to shut you up. his other hand is palming over your pelvis, digging into what little space is left between him and you, groping for the opening to your suit. you buck hard enough to almost throw him off when his hand finds the flap and maneuvers across bare skin.

his claw teases the edges of your knob, tickling the skin around your sheath, trailing down to massage the thin lip of your nook, sliding a gentle claw into the tight wet folds.

 _(was it always like this?_ you can't remember. of all the things you recall, so few of them have to do with your own past. layer by layer parts of you had been stripped away and then thrown back as ragged chunks that--with the help of Zahhak's technology--were hastily stitched back onto you, trying to reassemble a functioning mind from a maze of shattered memories.)

when he plunges an entire finger into your nook, you find it hard to draw in enough air to breathe and in desperation start licking at his hand, slobbering over the palm, trying to gross him out into withdrawing the way you usually do.

it works for a moment. he quickly relinquishes the hold and makes a frustrated sound as he stares at the drool slithering down his wrist. “you little knob-slopper!!” he shouts then grinds his wet palm into your face, smearing the sticky mess over the exposed half of it, making you shudder from the slimey feel.

“59RRY.” you say, but at least you feel the nook-finger withdraw. your relief is cut short when he toys with the hard ring of chitin protecting the opening of your sheath, the skin loosening to allow the swollen tip of your bulge to poke out.

Cronus unzips the front of his tight pants and massages his own hardening length, eyes shut tight as he concentrates on the pleasure he's giving himself...he's frowning as he runs a hand up and down his bulge, trying to keep the tactile phallus from wrapping around his wrist. his movements are rough and perfunctory and so different from his delicate fondling of your own intimates, like he doesn't enjoy handling himself ( _too many lonely nights must've worn him out—_ the thought comes, then goes, leaving only an unspoken pressure deep in your throat. all those missing words wander off and fall through the holes in your head)

he doesn't open his eyes and keeps his mouth shut up for once, even when he's groping around your crotch for what little erection you've managed. he's probably imagining it's someone else beneath him, someone else's bulge that his is going to urgently wrap itself around. maybe he's imagining that you're a responsive partner, imagining the dirty words you're supposed to say and the sensual touches any normal lover would return.

you feel useless. and when you feel that you begin panting out “1M S0RRY, 1M S0RRY--”

Cronus takes your length in hand with his own, rubbing them against one another until his takes the lead by spiraling around your's—a purple swirl to your yellow. the friction running along your cock is unbearable, and you cry out. his bulge has wrapped so tightly around your own that it's beginning to cut off bloodflow, leaving you painfully hard and swollen. he's chewed open his cigarette, tearing the paper with sharp teeth so that the stuffing is falling out.

you don't want this. pleasure shoots up your torso. you don't want it at all. (there was a time that you wanted this, you think, wanted it so bad it tore you up inside, but you don't want it anymore, you've rearranged your mind, you've changed, why can't they _understand_ ).

your brain cracks open and bleeds thoughts

you didn't want to and-

why couldn't anyone just _listen_ , why, why _why_ ?! you kept screaming and they couldn't hear you! you must be saying all the _wrong things_ \--

(if you didn't mess up so much maybe they would have believed you. maybe if you weren't always shouting they could tell when you're crying out. maybe if someone would just actually listen)

listen _listen LISTEN –!_

“N0,” you say and try to push at his chest, try to get him to stop and move off of you. try to get his long slimy length to stop rubbing along your own. try to stop clenching your nook in uncontrollable arousal, your body warring with your need to _get away.  
(They have to get away.)_

white noise starts building in your head. you alternate between clawing, grasping, pushing at his arms and letting your hands fall still at your sides in exhaustion until your entire body sags in his grip. faint dots and lines of static blur your vision, making the air look full of gnats that match the creepy-crawling feeling right beneath your skin. you feel infested with bad things. they're boiling your blood again.

he still hasn't opened his eyes. the expression on his face is one of deep concentration and frustration. his breathing is rough and you can feel his pulse through his bulge, pounding in anticipation. his hands clasp onto your sides, fingers leaving bruises with a grip that could crack bones.

you let out a shrill chirp of pain ( _listen--!_ ) and hear Cronus muttering “ _...fuck, mit...youre such a good friend...”_

you can feel the building tremors that're rocking his body vibrating through the both of you. your bulge lets out a preemptive spurt of thick yellow lubricating goop. the reaction assaults you with thoughts that you are betraying _her_ with this--with every hard stroke on your cock that leaves you gasping for air, spit dribbling over the side of your face and pooling beside your head.

_sorry latula sorry_

you're left panting from unwanted pleasure. there is so much static in and around you that you think you're no longer on the same wavelength as reality. you've stopped moving at all because every movement makes you want to throw up.

and even if vertigo weren't spinning your vision, unscrewing your head from your body, you're not sure you could move anymore because you have struggled so long and so hard against this and you are so tired and _so angry_. and because of all that you are guilty and because you are guilty _you're sorry._

“im gonna pail,” Cronus breathes, voice surprisingly soft though his hands are clenching tightly on your hips. but there isn't a bucket in sight and a surge of panic rushes through you and leaves you shivering like a wet beast left in cold air.

your spills will splatter onto the grass and everyone will see it there, everyone will be witness to the dried remains of this depravity, see how you failed again, see how they failed _you again_ \--

Cronus' stupid creepy jacket is making squelching sounds, slicked by his excessive perspiration caused by his refusal to remove the thick garment. his breath has begun hitching and his movements are erratic, his length so painfully twisted with your own that it's impossible to tell where you end and he begins but for the color.

you feel the familiar weight of dread and doom in the cavernous pits of your body. there's a pressure between your legs begging for release.

you know what is coming and you hate it but you still clench your fists and brace yourself as if standing alone against the cold engulfment of cruel tides.

as he growls and cums, you close your eyes and ride the waves of destruction.

/


End file.
